RIVER EROSION.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 238, 8 October 1935, Page 5

RIVER EROSION.

TOWNSHIP IN DANGER. PROBLEM ON EAST COAST. MOVEMENT IN THE WAIPOA. (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) GISBORNTE, this day. Residents of the Muriwai area are disturbed by evidence of a renewed movement in the Waipaoa River estuary, 13 miles north-west from Gisborne. to the westward and southward. In the past two or three years nearly half a mile has been added to the length <ii the river and during the last 12 months the movement has been accelerated.

Last winter saw further serious erosion on the river front of Pakowliai and only a short distance now separates the river itself from the old swamp which a few years ago was at least half a mile from the river at the closest point. It is estimated that 40 acres of land went into the river in the neighbourhood of the swamp during June, when there was a strong fresh in the river combined with a heavy sea which had the efl'oct of banking lip 'he river waters and deflecting their f ,rce ill a south-westerly direction. A long sandspit has been built up on the seaward side of thy estuary and the gent!" ill tendency is for this bank to extend, turning the river water in against the natural curve of the foreshore and increasing the erosive effect on the Pakowhai side of the estuary. It is anticipated that the river will break into the low lands which arc now covered by the Pakowhai lagoon in course of time and that the township of Muriwai may even be endangered by erosion.